“…now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.”— 1st Samuel 8:5
“The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar.” — John 19:15
As dogs return to their vomit[1]so the unregenerate will always prefer the bondage of tyrants over the liberty of the Spirit[2]. Towards the end of Samuel’s life and career as judge of Israel the people desired a king to rule over them, “like all the nations.”
Moses indeed predicted that Israel would one day raise up a king:
“When thou art come unto the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, and shalt possess it, and shalt dwell therein, and shalt say, I will set a king over me, like as all the nations that are about me[3]…”
And in that prediction the people of God were explicitly forbidden from raising up a foreign king: “Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, whom the LORD thy God shall choose: one from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee: thou mayest not set a stranger over thee, which is not thy brother.[4]”
In their worldliness and hardness of heart the people attempted to overthrow God’s established order and set up a dynasty of their own choosing. The Lord bid Samuel to grant them their request, saying “they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me[5].” Likewise, by the time of Christ’s incarnation the Israelites have rejected the King of Kings and acknowledge only the pagan emperor of Rome as their king, in complete defiance of the law of Moses the Pharisees pretended to uphold. They swore up and down that they were Abraham’s seed and they “were never in bondage to any man[6]” even as they paid heavy tribute to Caesar[7].
But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members[8]. We all have this carnal mind that exalts sin and loves the world. Apart from the intervention of the Holy Spirit, we will remain dead in our sins, never supposing that there is anything wrong with us. We will be like all the other people around us, eating and drinking, marrying and being given in marriage, not realizing what is going on until the flood comes[9] and takes us all away.
Be careful not to go the way of the world, setting up foreign kings and strange gods in your heart.
Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen[10]
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